Symposium held to discuss ways to fight NTT's massive job cuts

A symposium was held on September 1 in Tokyo to discuss ways to block the
100,000 job cut that Nippon Telegraph and Telephone (NTT), Japan's largest
telecom group, is going to carry out.

About 300 people, including NTT workers, took part in the symposium
organized jointly by the National Confederation of Trade Unions (Zenroren)
and the Telecommunication Industry Workers' Union (Tsushin-roso).
Tsushin-roso President Iwasaki Shun, lawyer Sakamoto Osamu, and Zenroren
Secretary General Ban'nai Mitsuo were the panelists.

Iwasaki stated that he is afraid the NTT plan, which will abandon the
group's mission to serve the public interest, will be copied by many other
Japanese corporations as a model of restructuring. He also pointed out that
NTT's plan to outsource telephone maintenance and repair jobs will affect
people's lives. Referring to the proposal for NTT workers' early retirement
at age 50 only to be rehired by NTT subsidiaries with 15-30 percent wage
cuts, he said this amounts to establishing a retirement system at 50.

Sakamoto Osamu, a lawyer, said, "What NTT is trying to do is discriminate
against workers based on age and impose unilateral changes of work rules to
the detriment of workers. All this is in violation of the Constitution and
labor laws." He advised the audience to make the utmost use of present laws
that are intended to protect workers' basic rights.

Zenroren Secretary General Ban'nai Mitsuo said that what underlies the
NTT plan is Japanese and U.S. multinational corporations' greed for
maximizing profits. They are trying to achieve this by using information
technology as a lever. Workers' response should be an increased effort to
broaden their social and international perspectives, he added.

Ban'nai called for struggles to get NTT to retract its restructuring
plan. At the same time, he emphasized the need for workers to make clear
their minimum demands to protect their rights: NTT must not impose worsened
working conditions on those who agree to be transferred to subsidiaries,
must secure jobs for those who opted to stay in their present positions; and
refrain from worsening their working conditions through wage cuts or other
means. (end)